


Keep my light in your eyes

by stjarna



Series: Writing Prompts / Drabbles / Requests [14]
Category: Agents of S.H.I.E.L.D. (TV)
Genre: A ton of feelings and angst and all that packed into one, Angst, Chapter 1: Post-Episode: s03e02 Purpose in the Machine, Chapter 2: In the Future, F/M, Feelings, Feels, Grief, Hope, Love, MCD (non-violent) in CHAPTER 2, Made me cry writing it, PTSD, Post-Episode: s03e02 Purpose in the Machine, Post-Maveth (Chapter 1), Read at Your Own Risk, This is not a fluffy fic!, just be warned, made my husband cry reading it
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2017-01-15
Updated: 2017-01-15
Packaged: 2018-09-17 13:19:13
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 2
Words: 1,912
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/9326552
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/stjarna/pseuds/stjarna
Summary: Based on the tumblr prompt: Fitzsimmons + "Stay awake"





	1. Post-“Purpose in the Machine”

**Author's Note:**

> _Warning:_ There _will_ be a MCD in Chapter 2. You've been warned! Read at your own risk. Seriously, I made myself cry. I don't think I've ever managed that before.
> 
> For CShalott, because I have an inkling she won't mind the pain. Thanks for making me rip my own heart out. It was cathartic.

Fitz opens the door, holding it open and turning on the lights.

“Home sweet home,” he says, but something in his tone tells Jemma that he’s hesitant to sound too cheerful.

The corners of her mouth quirk up, almost involuntarily. Her eyes nervously glance at the familiar interior of her bunk. She feels the muscles in her thighs twitching, like they’re eager to move her legs, while her brain is forcing them to hold back, not allowing her to step forward.

Everything still seems surreal, _un_ real; and the feeling is only enhanced by the fact that her senses feel foreign in a world she hasn’t been for six months. Everything sounds different, looks different, smells different, feels different. When she walks, it feels as if gravity isn’t strong enough to hold her to this Earth, her Earth, home. It’s hard to breathe. Lights blind her. Noises pain her ears. It feels like a dream, a strange mix of nightmare and beautiful bliss.

“Jemma?”

Even though his voice is barely above a whisper, the sound, the sudden jerk out of the comfort of her mind and back into reality, makes her flinch. She blinks rapidly and wets her dry lips. She lets out a shaky breath, before her mind finally complies, allowing her legs to step forward.

“My own bed,” Jemma whispers, and the slow realization that maybe she _can_ trust her own eyes makes her smile weakly.

“It’s been waiting for you,” Fitz says, smiling encouragingly, but suddenly his eyes grow serious, avoiding her gaze.

_Waiting for you._

_He_ had waited for her. Six months. Six months of clinging to the hope that she was alive somewhere. She hadn’t heard the whole story, but her friends had given her enough hints on the flight back to the Playground that she knew how those six months had been gnawing on him, how he never gave up hope. He _never_ gave up hope. She had. She had given up. She had given in.

“You should lie down,” Fitz interrupts the guilt trying to take root in her soul.

“I slept on the plane,” Jemma mumbles quietly, staring at the soft blanket draped over white sheets. “I’m fine.”

She looks at him when he doesn’t respond. Then she chuckles sadly. “Look whom I’m trying to lie to,” she scoffs. “You’ve always read me like an open book.”

He lets out a single quiet laugh. “I don’t think that’s entirely true,” he replies.

She’s not sure how to respond, but he doesn’t seem to be expecting a reply.

Silently, he walks over to her bed, turning on the lamp on her bedside table. His eyes are fixed on her as he returns to where she’s standing by the door. He reaches beside her and turns off the ceiling light.

Jemma blinks a few times to adjust to the different light setting; exhales, almost a sigh of relief. And the serenity that slowly settles in her body conjures a smile onto her face.

“Does that feel better for your eyes?” Fitz asks, his tone hushed and quiet.

Jemma nods gratefully.

“You really need more sleep,” Fitz remarks.

“I know,” Jemma sighs, her eyes looking past him to her bed.

“Is it the nightmares?” Fitz asks. “Like you had on the Zephyr?”

Jemma chuckles at the reminder of how well he knows her. She inhales deeply, before releasing the air, slowly, through her rounded lips.

“Yes, but—” she says quietly. She clears her throat; her heart beating too rapidly, too distractingly to allow her brain to form the words she wants to say. Her gaze wanders away from his eyes, to a point of nothingness in front of her, blurry and shapeless.

Only when she feels Fitz’s hands gently squeezing her shoulders does she look back up.

Jemma wets her dry lips. She blinks and sees a vision of herself, a blurry, shapeless image, bathed in a strange blue night. Dry lips. Deprived. Dying.

“I couldn’t find water,” she finally admits. His eyes are resting on hers, listening patiently, worried, but hers glaze over, take her back to the hellhole she had almost accepted to call home. “It was all desert. Sand. No vegetation to speak of. Rocks. I didn’t see any signs of fauna. And it was dark. The sun didn’t come. Ever. I waited at first. Followed protocol. But I had to find water. Water.” Her eyes briefly refocus on him. “You know how long a person can survive without water and… and… I was cutting it pretty close.” An unexpected chuckle escapes her lips. “I was so dehydrated. I could barely think anymore. My head—” Instinctively, her fingers reach for her temples. “My head hurt. I had trouble walking. Felt dizzy and… and I was so tired… so tired.” She doesn’t see his face in front of her anymore. She’s back there. Reliving it as she tells him. “But I knew that if I slept, I wouldn’t wake up.” She pauses.

“‘Stay awake! Stay awake!’ I told myself that over and over and over. ‘Stay awake! You stay awake, you live. You sleep, you die.’”

Jemma shakes her head, as if to reset an etch-a-sketch, as if to erase those horrible hours spent waiting for death. She takes another deep breath and looks back at him. “And even after I found water, that kind of thinking, that kind of fear… it was always there somehow… you sleep, you die… and it’s _still_ there.” She smiles weakly. “And the nightmares don’t help.”

His hands are rubbing gently up and down her arms. His eyes are soft, and warm, and caring when he speaks. “What if _I_ stay awake?” he suggests. “I’ll stay here, and I’ll stay awake, and you sleep.”

She lets out a quiet laugh. “Fitz,” she says, shaking her head. “You need to sleep, too. You look terrible!”

“Gee, thanks,” he jokes, making her chuckle.

“Believe me, Jemma, you need it more than me,” he continues, and she can’t say anything in return because she knows he’s right.

“Plus,” he adds, “once you’ve gotten some rest, I can head to my bunk and sleep. Doubt Coulson’s gonna make either of us work tomorrow… or the next day… or the day after that.”

She chuckles, before letting out a deep sigh. “Okay,” she finally agrees.


	2. In the future

His sunken eyes open slowly, like it takes effort, like it’s a struggle. The blue of his irises looks grey, dull, hazy; but when they see her they seem to light up; not as much as they used to. He’s weak, too weak, too tired, but he still wills the corners of his mouth to smile for her.

Her thumb gently caresses the back of his thin, clammy hand, feeling each bone. It’s been resting between hers for days, ever since they had decided that it was time to move him to the hospital.

“Took a little nap there?” she asks, smiling at him.

His nod is barely noticeable. He hadn’t been speaking much. It had taken too much effort in the end.

She blinks away the tears that are beginning to sneak up on her. “You should sleep some more,” she suggests softly, still smiling, trying to stop her lips from trembling.

“No.” His reply is barely more than a quiet breath.

She chuckles briefly, before pressing her lips together, preparing to finally say those words that she’d been rehearsing in her mind for days.

“You’re still doing it, aren’t you?” she teases him. “Staying awake for _me_. Like you did after I returned from Maveth? After Will died? After Lincoln died? _Whenever_ I had nightmares?”

He blinks slowly, a silent acknowledgment, a silent confession.

She squeezes his hand gently and wets her lips. She bites down on the lower one, the mild pain allowing her to push back her tears long enough to speak.

“It’s okay,” she says, her voice shaking, but her smile telling him that she speaks the truth.

“You don’t have to do that anymore, Fitz.” She takes a slow breath, trying to stop her jaw from trembling.

“I’ll be okay.” She pauses, ensuring that her words have time to reach his depleted mind.

“It’s time for _me_ to stay awake, and for _you_ to sleep.”

His face becomes blurry as tears flood her eyes.

“I’ll be okay. And I want you to know, that all those waking moments I spent with you… the happy ones, and the sad ones, and the painful ones, and the _ridiculous_ ones, and…. all those moments spent with you, and all the ones sleeping by your side, in your arms—” She exhales. “They will make up for the pain of those waking moments I will have to spend without you from now on.”

With her left hand still holding on to his, Jemma gets up from her chair and reaches for his face with her right hand. She feels a tear rolling down his cheek, and catches it with her thumb, surprised that his body still has enough fluids left to produce any.

“Kids?” Fitz whispers.

She smiles. “They went to the cafeteria. They’ll be back any moment now.”

His lips are twitching, wanting to speak but unable to.

“You can wait until they’re here,” Jemma says.

She sits back down and wipes away her own tears, before bringing her hand back to caress his. She smiles at him, and to her it seems as if his face, his eyes shine more radiant and serene than they had in months.

She’s not sure how much time has passed when the door opens and Peggy and Iain step inside. She turns around to face them, and she knows that the weak smile she is sending their way is enough to let them know that it’s time. They both nod, and quietly walk to the other side of Fitz’s bed.

Fitz’s arm stirs briefly as he tries to will his hand to reach for his children. Peggy steps closer, grabbing her father’s hand, squeezing it gently, smiling at him reassuringly, while Iain puts his hand on Fitz’s shoulder. The shimmer in their children’s eyes is the only sign of their sadness. They’ve known for a while. They’ve prepared. Except that it was impossible to be fully prepared.

“See, Fitz, they’re here,” Jemma says, and once again the fist tightening its grip on her heart forces her to pause.

“You can sleep now,” she continues, as tears fill her eyes. “And we’ll stay awake. Together.”

Her hand stroking his ashen skin trembles as she speaks.

“And I’ll hold your hand,” she says quietly, as his tired blue eyes look at her.

“And they’ll hold on to you, too,” she adds, nodding towards their children.

“Because maybe then we can catch a bit of your energy.”

She chuckles sadly when the corners of his mouth quirk up, so faint that probably only she had noticed.

“Because no energy in the universe is created—”

She notices how his eyes blink. Once. Twice. Slowly. Tired.

“—and none is destr—”

The continuous flatline tone of his heart rate monitor makes her stop mid-word.

She feels ripples of sadness causing her body to tremble, to shake, and yet she smiles through her tears as she sees his closed eyes, the peace that surrounds his lifeless body.

She glances at her children, sees tears streaming down their faces, as they hold on to their father’s hand, their father’s shoulder, absorbing his energy.

“Goodnight, Fitz,” Jemma whispers. “Goodnight.”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Title based on “Say Goodnight” by Beth Nielsen-Chapman
> 
> Say goodnight not good-bye  
> You will never leave my heart behind  
> Like the path of a star  
> I'll be anywhere you are
> 
> In the spark that lies beneath the coals  
> In the secret place inside your soul  
> Keep my light in your eyes  
> Say goodnight not good-bye
> 
> Don't you fear when you dream  
> Waking up is never what it seems  
> Like a jewel buried deep  
> Like a promise meant to keep
> 
> You are everything you want to be  
> So just let your heart reach out to me  
> I'll be right by your side  
> Say goodnight not good-bye
> 
> You are everything you want to be  
> So just let your heart reach out to me  
> Keep my light in your eyes  
> Say goodnight not good-bye


End file.
